Sidetracked
by The Sh33p
Summary: A look into how things might have been had the series delved deeper into the lives of the Shuffle Alliance members, rather than the amount of attention it put onto Domon. Mild AU, rating may go up due to language or violence. Long overdue update complete!
1. Prologue: Past Dealings I

**Disclaimer:** I do not own G Gundam, although I do lay claim to any of the original characters or mobile suits/fighters/what-have-you that may or may not appear in this story. Consider this disclaimer valid for the whole thing.  
  
**Foreword:** Minor-AU ahead! Some ages, dates and events _have_ been changed. Domon and Rain are not the focus of this story, and the right music to listen to while reading it(if you do that sorta thing) is below.  
  
Evanescence - Eternal(Instrumental)

* * *

**Sidetracked**  
Prologue: Past Dealings I

An explosion ripped through the hull of the Kiev IV, shattering the already tensed quiet that had settled through the now-darkened corridors of the pirate vessel. Beams continued tearing through the externals of the structure, and the crew - formerly numbering in at something like fifty or sixty - was now huddled up together in a single hallway that had somehow come through things unscathed, filing towards escape pods that theyd always known they would have to use someday. Several of the men were yelling out for others to hurry, but the process was still slow - they wanted to make sure that the pods were working, even as Neo Russian space frigates bombarded the crashed vessel with lasers and pulse cannons.  
  
One scene in particular though, roared out above the frantic yells and damnable explosions that filled the background as two men basically fought a personal tug-of-war, one of them impossibly outmatched as the other practically yanked him off of his arm.  
  
"Im going, and that's _final_! If there are survivors, I can't let them just _die_!" Came a loud shout as another explosion rocked the already disintegrating hull.  
  
"_Captain_! I can't let _you _die, either! We came _in _together and god _damn it_, were getting _out together_!"  
  
Lethal quiet. For a moment, the vastly smaller crewman's pleas seemed to seep through, and the explosions almost vanished from perception as the larger man considered his options and words.  
  
"And besides, if the hull of the station's been breached, what good can one man do?! We don't have any other suits and no one's willing to go!"  
  
Another pause. Finally, a reply.  
  
"You always had a good head on your shoulders, Mikhail, but your heart's not quite in the right place," Argo Gulskii said, and mean't it, only to sucker punch his vastly smaller subordinate in the gut before he could respond. At that, artificial gravity gave out and the custom-made space suit's magnetic boots activated, locking him into place. Another moment passed and Mikhail's slightly overweight form flew through newly draining atmosphere, freeing Argo to reach up and pull his helmet on, locking it into place automatically.  
  
"Get out of here! Everyone off the ship, **_NOW!_**" The giant of a man barked out, his imposing presence sounding angry enough that it jolted more fear into the escaping crewmen than _any _gun or missile ever could. Airlocks slammed shut, he paused for a moment in reflection and then watched as his crew deserted him to save their own lives - though there was nothing cowardly about it. He _had_ ordered them, after all, and if he hadnt, they wouldve all willingly gone to their graves for him.  
  
_"I wonder if Jason was ever as confident in **his** crew as I am in mine?"_ Argo mused for a split second, giving himself a grim smile before turning and bolting down the corridor as quickly as he could in the heavy, restrictive suit he was wearing, every step leaving a clank to echo through in the increasingly thin air. He didn't need to see to find his way around the Kiev IV, a blessing since all the lights promptly went out with one last burst of gunfire, but he was still thankful that his helmet boasted a light just above the visors anyway, he would need it if the stations power had gone out.  
  
A few minutes brought him the rest of the way across the ship from its broadside, stopping with a linegun in hand - hed gotten it somewhere during his run. There was a hole in the hull, it ran straight through to a room in plain sight, and he almost thought, for a moment, that he could hear screaming. No time to wait and think though, he drew back and fired the cable straight into the floor, the impact causing spikes to jut out from the bottom and root it in place long enough for him to mount it and slide down into a room that boasted draining atmosphere and two lone occupants, a man and a woman.  
  
"**_NORMA!!!_**" The man cried out as Argo felt his boots lock down to the metal grating of the floor, the vacuum effect of space suddenly shifting his weight around as the cable strained and groaned, matching the metallic shrieks echoing all over the room. Blindly at first, he reached out a hand from where one of the voices was coming from, turning away from the ponytailed man and setting his eyes onto the blonde woman he was screaming about.  
  
"**_ANDY!!!_**" She yelled back at the top of her lungs, struggling to hold on to the piece of flooring that she had rooted herself too. "Hang on!" Argo yelled out, though his voice was muffled by the suit and the decreasing supply of air to carry his words around. His left hand extended out, and his other remained clasped almost painfully to the line that kept him from being sucked out as well, the metallic wiring threatening to shrivel and tear under the pressure of his fingers.  
  
"Take my hand!" He yelled out again, and this time she heard him, responding if not to the words, then to the gesture. One hand tightened onto the grating of the floor, the other reached out to seek the virtual lifeline that the pirate was trying to give her, and for a moment it seemed as if everything would be alright. Argo smiled imperceptably behind the visor of his helmet, still straining against the suit's make just to try and reach her. "You're almost there!" He shouted.  
  
"_Just a little further_!"  
  
And then floor broke away as one final explosion rocked the station, leaving Norma Graham to promptly take on a look of damning resignation, burning holes through the otherwise iron giant's soul with one final scream as she was sucked out into space.  
  
Everything went silent, but the truth was that Argo couldn't even hear _anything_ for a number of seconds before he finally turned around to see if the man had somehow died yet, an unknown humidity starting to seep into his skin and run down his cheeks. For a moment, that silence held. It was deafening, suffocating and condemning all at once, damning _both_ of them to knowing that they had utterly failed. For Argo, it was like a pit had just formed in his chest, and for the man identified as Andrew, words couldn't quite describe it.  
  
Silence shattered.  
  
"You... You killed her..."  
  
Argo didn't - _couldn't _- respond. Andrew's eyes were starting to water as shock and horror turned to outright hatred and anger.  
  
"You _killed her_," the smaller man said for the second time in a row, the emotion boiling beneath the surface but showing through in his voice. He sounded like he was about to either go on a rampage or throw up, seemingly oblivious to the fact that all of the oxygen in the room was blowing out. Oblivious to the fact that he would probably _die_ in a matter of a minute unless help arrived or he could find a space suit.  
  
"**_YOU KILLED HER!!!_**" He finally screamed in accusation, so loudly that it threatened to ripple through even the vacuum of space itself. Almost pathetically, the scrawnily built Canadian threw himself from the grating of the floor and lunged at Argo with obvious intent to kill him, though the suction of the air and the lack of gravity cut his attempt short by critical inches as his fingers missed the Russian space pirates helmet, leaving him to flail around for a few fractions of a second before a vicelike grip clamped down on his ankle.  
  
Screaming and sobbing despite himself, Andrew fought tooth and nail with his larger savior only to find himself pulled closely to where the two were within arms reach of each other, a gigantic fist crashing across his left temple with enough force to render him completely unconscious as a result. Almost lifelessly, he found himself slung over Argo's shoulder, where he remained as the black suited Russian trudged relentlessly towards the nearest exit, unaware of the fact that he himself was crying as well.  
  
Some time later, be it a few seconds or a few minutes, a metallic, inches-thick door slipped shut under failing power reserves, leaving Argo to finally let go of the unconscious Andrew, who drifted up into the ceiling and stayed there, held by the whims of no gravity, in the same pose hed been in when held over the larger man's shoulder. At that, Gulskii lifted a hand up and popped his helmet off, swinging it back and staring blankly at the wall across from him.  
  
They would be coming for him soon. Theyd probably already taken his crew, but they would be coming for _him_ soon. He wouldn't fight back though, not this time. A woman had _died_ because of him, after all, he _deserved_ to go to the harshest prison that the Neo Russian government could throw him into.  
  
With resignation obvious across his already grim face, the giant of a man sat down on the floor and waited, tethered in place by his boots.

* * *

The trial proceedings were swift. It had taken all of a day and a half for the prosecution to finish going through the decade long criminal streak of piracy that had become something akin to a modern-day legend in Neo Russian society - one that was referenced in rap and rock songs, one that pop artists played off of for added celebrity.  
  
New Moscow's highest court had done the job of handling the trials, which were for little more than show. It had all started with lower ranked men from the surviving fifteen or sixteen members of the Kiev's fifty-five man crew. Half had pled guilty, the other half, no contest to the charges levelled against them. They weren't even granted the illusion of defense attorneys - no lawyer in his or her right _mind_ would take up a case as hopeless as the one against these men, even _with_ the kind of publicity it would bring.  
  
But finally, it had come down to the big one - both metaphorically and literally. At 7'2" and possessed of a naturally tremendous build, the thirty-one year old Argo Gulskii had the look that he couldve probably broken free at any time he wanted and the dozens of guards wouldn't have had the slightest chance on Earth, or the colony, of stopping him. Clad in a prison uniform, he stood at least a head above every single man and woman in the packed court room, and was almost able to look at the judge eye-to-eye, were his desk a little lower or Argo a little taller.  
  
The shackles on his wrists weighed at least a hundred pounds each - theyd both been made out of small excesses of the material used for making Gundams, and each also housed a pair of beam emitters. No one trusted ordinary steel chains to hold a man as notorious as Argo, and they didn't trust guns to stop him either, as evidenced by the jolter strapped to his chest. Under normal conditions, a jolter was a 'clean execution device,' though its power could be lowered by bits to ensure that the wearer wasn't instantly fried to death, making it useful for work groups. In his case, they had a bomb waiting for him for when he was convicted.  
  
Bombs were just more intimidating, after all.  
  
"Argo Gulskii!" The judge's voice boomed. Almost instantly, the huge prisoner's eyes glanced around and sought out the loudspeakers that had been so perfectly concealed. Imposing authority was a Russian tradition, after all.  
  
"You have been accused of roughly fifty-eight counts of grand piracy in the frontier regions of deep space, as well as a single count of first degree murder! What do you say to this?!" He demanded, leaning forward and tilting his head to the side as if to better hear the accused. Like he really _needed_ to...  
  
For a moment, he considered. He was convicted already, everyone knew that and there wasn't really a point in defending himself and there wasn't really a point in trying to defend his crew, however much he wanted to. All of them - even skullheaded Sergei - deserved better than what they were getting, and whatever he said would probably be censored by the government if it went for too long. For that moment, two phrases came to mind.  
  
Guilty as charged or not, he had a political message to get out, one that he _deeply_ wanted to get around. Norma Graham - he now knew her name from when they were throwing charges at him left and right - would probably not have forgiven him anyway, and an apology to her and her husband wouldve been twisted by the media or the government, or both, into something else entirely. A slow nod to himself, and a very subtle smirk that only barely showed on his grim face as he lifted his head up and stared the judge right in the eyes without so much as a single ounce of defeat.  
  
"_Free Mars_. Id do it all over again if I had the chance," he said, and meant it, though he knew that censors had turned off the microphones the very _instant_ he had finished the second word. The judge was unamused, to say the least.  
  
"Is that _all_?"  
  
"If I said more, Id be electrocuted."  
  
The crowds silenced even more than before. Guards tensed, the judge sighed and sat back in his chair, one hand pressed against his face, as if he was trying to hide from the glare he was having thrown at him.

* * *

Prison followed. If there was anything Argo hated more than the very concept of going to prison, it was the knowledge that he wasn't going into it alone, nor was he going into it with any chance of getting out. The bomb currently strapped to his chest had ensured that much, but what made it all the worse was that - for some reason - a visitor had been allowed. Who it was, he didnt know, and he didn't particularly _care _very much either.  
  
At least, he _hadn't _cared until his handler herded him into the room and walked out, leaving him to stand there with a look that rested somewhere between mortified shock and an utter lack of surprise. That was because, of all people hed expected to see again in his lifetime, his mother _wasn't _one of them.  
  
"I don't suppose you're here to tell me about Elena getting married and having children, are you?" He asked, in obvious reference to his younger sister. His mother was unamused, giving him the same look that had often sent he and his sister _both_ running to the bedroom they had shared right up until their early teens.  
  
"No," Rashida Gulskii said with a voice as cold as ice and as hard as a diamond. "Though youd be pleased to know that you're an uncle of four little boys and girls who now don't know _what_ to think of you," she added, still having the same tone as she watched her only son nonchalantly roll his eyes in that way he would only do in _her_ presence. No one could bring out the defiance in someone quite like their mother, especially since Argo's father had never been that forceful of a man to begin with.  
  
"They can think of me as a dangerous political revolutionary, a legendary pirate or a guilty murderer. I don't really care," he said, doing his best to maintain an expression to match his voice. Rashida was unimpressed, standing up from her seat and regarding him quite clearly with the grim impression that most considered_ his_ trademark.  
  
"They don't know you well enough to judge you. Yet. You should _try_ to send them letters sometime, assuming this place even _allows_ that."  
  
"Is there any specific reason you came here, mother?" Argo asked coldly, finally managing to maintain the look to match his tone.  
  
From then on, they stood there for a number of moments.  
  
How long it was, neither really knew. At roughly 6'1", Rashida was a tall woman, possessed of an aged-but-feminine build, and a surprisingly young appearance for someone in her mid-sixties. She wore the same yellow dress that had always been her trademark, sleeveless and covered by an almost-black cape - though this one lacked the over-embelished neckpiece her favorite sported, and her hair was still done up in the same quasi-ridiculous style she _always_ kept it in.  
  
"No, Argo. Nothing at all," she finally replied, narrowing her eyes briefly.  
  
"Youll be the death of me someday, my boy. I just know it," she said before turning and rapping on the door twice to be lead away. Argo only snorted impassively and cracked his neck from side to side as the other door - the one hed come in through - slipped open and the usual handler stepped inside.  
  
The next time he saw his mother, she would be donning the moniker of the Black Joker.

* * *

A year dredged by. He and his crew settled into a routine - solitary confinement for Argo, shared cells for everyone else. Work ten hours of the day, get two free to wander around in the enclosed yard that housed a single basketball court and an outdoor gym, little else. Food came in three meals a day, each of which was only _barely_ enough for any of them, though Argo tended to share his own since he was granted more than the others. Why did he get more? He didn't know, but he put it to use as best he could.  
  
Bathing was the biggest challenge though, everyone only got ten minutes a week with a heated, indoor water hose in a dimly lit room, overseen constantly by a guard with a gun. They had one minute to dry out and they _had_ to do it properly or chances were high that theyd catch a cold, pneumonia, become hypothermic, possibly lose a limb to frostbite...  
  
It had all been quite humbling for the majority of Argo's crew, those that survived, anyway. Ivan had been the first to go, hed never been that strong to begin with and the cold had taken him during their first few weeks at the prison, several others had followed. Of a crew once numbering at fifty-five, only eight remained, including Argo. Skullheaded Sergei, his cousin Andre, Mikhail, Alexi, Pavel and Wayne. Every last one of them had gone through several degrees of hell over the past year, ranging from guard ordered 'initiations' into prison society - which often involved slugging it out with other inmates until one either dropped, gave up or died - to flat-out beatings whenever a rule, real or imagined, was broken.  
  
All of this made it even more absurd, in Argo's mind, for the same government he had fought so hard to bring down, the same government that had so brutalized he and his remaining friends and the same government he _despised_ more than _anything else_ in the known _universe_ to now come asking for _his help_.  
  
"What kinda joke is this?" He asked from where he sat on the cell bed, the only lighting in the room being that of the early morning sunrise. The shackles weighed a bit heavier than usual on his forearms, and the beam-chain that bound them together seemed a bit dimmer than it usually did, though those were the least of his worries. The overweight man in front of him narrowed his eyes, a recorder in hand, taping the whole conversation.  
  
"This isn't a joke, Gulskii," he stated in reply, his voice sounding a bit strained. From fear or contempt, Argo didn't know. He still had _quite_ a reputation for being dangerous though, that much was for certain, and a part of him almost _liked_ that fact.  
  
"This is an offer from the great hand of the Neo Russian government - you can fight for us in the coming Gundam Tournament and win the freedom of yourself and your friends, or you can stay here and rot for the rest of your miserable life."  
  
"Why me?" Argo asked suspiciously, still staring at the concrete floor he had come to know so well through the past year. That seemed to gain a more favorable response from the officer, who perked up almost instantly.  
  
"Because you're the only man available with the proper mixture of reputation, size and raw _power_ to stand up to Neo Greece's Marcilot Cronos, the favorite to win the next tournament," he stated plainly, as if trying to feed the apparent inkling of an ego that Argo _supposedly_ had, a rumor that had been created, spread and overly hyped by the government controlled media. It was a futile effort, earning no response for a short series of moments, during which, Argo could almost hear the visitors teeth rattling.  
  
"What happened to the previous fighter if you had to come to me?"  
  
"Guri Drosdov _died_ during the initial Final Eight of the last tournament, in England. Typhoon Gundam died with him."  
  
"Then Im your only alternative and you don't even have a Gundam built for me. How _utterly_ amusing," Argo bluffed, dragging the man towards a favorable deal. They wouldve been better off sending in a hostage negotiator over this twit.  
  
"_Actually_, officials are going to be putting together a customized Gundam for you - should you accept the offer," came the reply, sounding like a rather delicate cord had been struck. Oh well, no point in trying to lure him in anymore.  
  
"Ill do it on several conditions," Argo began, picking his words carefully and looking up from the floor, finally meeting the visitor eye-to-eye in the process. He didn't stand up though, he wouldn't have to play the card of his imposing size just yet.  
  
"One: My Gundam will be built _here_, and it will be built to _my_ specifications, no one elses," he continued before the other could gather the guts to try and interrupt him. "Two: I will _not_ be seperated from my friends during the construction. Three: You will _fire and replace every single guard and soldier here with someone better suited to handle the job_."  
  
The man paled. Argo kept on.  
  
"And four: When I win the Gundam Fight, you _will_ release my friends and I, as well as providing permanent immunity from charges of piracy."  
  
He knew the last half of the fourth condition wouldn't be followed, but it was more than worth the shot at it. At that though, the man seemed to pause and switch off the recorder, looking over his shoulder with a slow, almost terrified nod, one that Argo thought was fearful because of him, though it mostly certainly _wasnt_.  
  
The door flipped open and a new voice, accompanied by a new visitor, cracked into Argo's ears. It sounded naturally annoyed, haughty and a bit high strung, and was also that of a woman.  
  
"The deal is accepted then," she stated with absolutely no room for arguement, walking into the cell in a full military uniform and holding what looked like the kind of gear a horse jock would use to urge his steed on a bit faster. Almost instantly, a singular thought whipped through Argo Gulskii's psyche, even as the woman introduced herself with all of the politeness of a vindictive bull in a china shop.  
  
"My name is Nastasha Zabigov..."  
  
_"What the hell did I just get myself into?"  
  
_"As of right now, I am _God_." 

_End Prologue I_

* * *

**Author's Note:** Just a few minor edits for this chapter, but for new readers, allow me to explain a few things:  
  
The Shuffle Alliance(Argo, Sai, George and Chibodee) are going to be the main focus of this fic, and the story will mostly follow their actions during the time when the series was going gaga for Domon. The prologues will each focus on one each, in the order of Argo, Sai, George and then Chibodee. Sai and Argo's ages have been changed, Argo will be about 35 by the time of the Gundam Fight and Sai will be around 11 or 12. If you dislike that, sorry, but it isn't my concern.  
  
As for Rashida Gulskii being the Black Joker, it's my take on a common plot device usually reserved for original characters. Not many people seem to bother with Argo too often, let alone give him any connection to the previous crestholder(then again, the same can probably be said for everyone but Domon), so there you have my reasoning. The names for Argo's crew, with exception of Sergei and Mikhail, were all made up, and if you're wondering why I listed a guy named Andre as Argo's cousin: There was a member of Argo's crew in the last episodes who struck me as looking like a shorter, thicker Argo with a different nose and hairstyle.  
  
That said, onto the next chapter!  
  
Sh33p out.


	2. Prologue: Past Dealings II

Foreword: Music is as follows.

Bruce Faulconer - A Little Help From A Friend

Chrono Cross - Another World

G Gundam - The China Shuffle(or Hack Sign - Magic and Sword)

Staind - So Far Away

Rurouni Kenshin - Departure(or Metallica - I Disappear)

* * *

Sidetracked

Prologue: Past Dealings II

Keiun grimaced. Normally appearing at least somewhat jovial, it was an expression that didn't quite fit him, though he would one day come to wear that same expression on an almost hourly basis, driving frown lines into existence that hadn't been there before. The silence in the room was close to deafening as he placed the letter down on the floor, a silence that wasn't broken easily until Feilong, the current master, spoke up, his own expression taut and restrained. 

"As you can see, this does not bode well for our dream," he said, still maintaining an impassive tone. He had never been particularly close to his son, but it was obvious that the letters content had stressed him severely. "In fact, it may very well spell the dreams end."

"Indeed," Zuisen finally agreed, having maintained his own wall of silence since reading the letter. A former Gundam Fighter himself, it didn't look as though the Temple stood much of a chance with its star pupil having only a year and a half to live, while the upcoming 13th Gundam Fight was still three years away. Sai Feilong had been too worn with the riggors of aging under the harsh training of the Shaolin style, while Keiun had never been willing enough to fight in the first place. Zuisen, on the other hand, had fought in the previous Gundam Fight, barely a year earlier.

He had made it as far as eleventh place before being eliminated by Gentle Chapman. He had been the first Shaolin monk to compete in the Gundam Fight in over thirty years, and he had lost.

He was also well versed in the dream shared by all three of the men sitting in the room, himself included. Even more so, he was painfully aware that they were among the best the Shaolin Temple had to offer.

"Damned Chicoline," Keiun growled out a bit hoarsely, reprimanding himself a second later and calming down before Zuisen and Feilong could do it for him. Still, his words bore an eerie ring of truth to them, however short they'd been. If not for the Chicoline Defection, none of them would've been having these troubles in the first place.

"I suppose," Feilong began, an aged glint shimmering in his good eye. The other had been blinded in an accident. "That we will have to improvise. The Chicoline Temple," he paused thoughtfully, planning through his words. Keiun and Zuisen were _both_ unamused. "Its rules are gentler than our own, but its style is still much the same, correct?"

Only Zuisen nodded. Keiun seemed a bit too disgusted to do anything but give a well concealed glare.

"Then my grandson will have to do."

"_What_?" Both asked harshly. Anyone but Feilong would've been attacked for such a comment, especially considering that Sai Saichi was literally the _only_ member of the Shaolin Temple who was under the age of forty.

"A seeming defection. I have a feeling that he can learn more under the relaxed rules of the Chicoline, much faster than he can under the strict guidelines of Shaolin. The techniques will be the same, but he will likely acquire them with much better progress."

"What you're saying, _Master_, is a near violation of the past two hundred years of Shaolin teachings," Zuisen objected, barely hiding his indignance under a layer of currently-false respect. "How is he to become a proper Shaolin warrior if he doesn't even achieve inner peace along the way?"

Feilong was silent. For a moment, Keiun and Zuisen _both_ feared that they had overstepped their boundaries.

And then he smiled softly, closing his eyes and continuing.

"The rules and teachings of our Temple are not static. They've changed numerous times to adapt to new threats and ideologies through the millennia. If they hadn't, Saichi would not even exist, and my son would have never been born to father him. He is a representation of change, a change that we must force ourselves to adapt to. If we must use a bit of treachery, then we will do just that, and spend the rest of our lives either atoning for it or seeing that we were right in doing so."

Another pause. The smile grew a bit wider.

"The Americans, if I recall correctly, said it best when they coined the phrase: 'What goes around, comes around.' Twenty-five years ago, every one of the Chicoline Temple's current upper echelon defected from the Shaolin Temple, I say it is time we returned the favor."

For the first time, Keiun spared a slight smirk and Zuisen merely nodded.

"Sai Saichi will learn inner peace, of that I am sure, because once he defects back to us, _you_ will be his guides," Feilong added, almost as an afterthought, to quell any potential doubts.

"That settles it then," Zuisen stated. "Yes, it does," Keiun agreed, so quickly that the other had only barely finished speaking. It was a habit between them that would grow to where they spoke and thought the same things and finished each others sentences in the coming years.

* * *

"I still... Do not understand this, Grandfather," an eight year old boy said with more respect and articulation than he would ever use for _anyone_ else. His head had been shaved bald, his skin was paler than it would one day become and his choice of clothing was the traditional wear of a Shaolin warrior monk-in-training, baggy pants with strings tied around the middle of each shin, slippers and a half-shirt that concealed most of the upper body except for the arms, one side of the chest and back and the shoulder of the exposed side, as well as a pair of white bands on the wrists. 

About the only recognizable aspect of this child was that his eyes were still the same, apple shade of red that they had been since shifting from brown at the age of two.

Feilong was impassive, and obviously straining to hold his neutrality on the matter. His grandson was all he had left outside of the Temple itself - his own wife had died of a rare cancer and his daughter-in-law had divorced his son shortly after Saichi had been enrolled in the Temple rather than being given the chance to live a relatively normal life.

"There is not much for you to understand in the first place, Saichi. Keiun will escort you into a marketplace frequented by Chicoline recruiters and there, you will desert him at a convenient moment and find one of them. From then on, you will spend the next three years studying the styles and practices of the Chicoline Temple, then return to us just prior to the Gundam try-outs."

"I still do not understand _why_ though," Saichi said again, looking up from where he was knelt down before the eighty year old Shaolin Master. The rushing sounds of the waterfall behind the old man put the scene into an almost serene sort of setting, allowing for a calm, collected mind in both of the Sai family members. It this case, it only made things a bit more confusing and hard to get for the younger of the two. Even if he was highly intelligent for his age, the prodigal son of Sai Lonbai was still a child.

"What's the point of defecting to another Temple just to learn the techniques that are Shaolin by right of creation?" He asked for the umpteenth time in the conversation, staring right into his grandfather's eyes without the slightest sign of hesitation, fear or intimidation. There was only respect.

Feilong sighed, looking for the right words and finding them all too easy to say when he succeeded.

"The point is that even though you can learn the same techniques here, there is no one at this temple who has the will to skip through the spiritual demands of attaining inner peace. To teach you as quickly as we need would go against the views of so many of the Shaolin Temple's members that it would be impossible to find a proper trainer who could keep up with your youth and potential," he explained. "We've become rigid, bitter from the Chicoline Defection. That rigidness is what would hold you back."

Another short pause.

"If I weren't so worn with age, _I_ would teach you myself, or take part in the coming Gundam Fight. I can do neither, and neither can anyone else. _You_ are our hope now, this plan is all that can save the Shaolin Temple from falling into nothing but memory."

At that, something dawned upon the younger of the two.

"Why not just wait until the 14th Tournament? Why now?"

This time, the answer didn't take so much as a thought to give, it was almost reflexive.

"Because the Shaolin Temple, as it is now, is only living on Neo-China's space colony for historical pride, pride that is rapidly vanishing. Even if it _is_ a national symbol, we're here only because the government is willing to pay our costs of living on the off-chance that we can produce a new champion in time for the Gundam Fight. If we fail to do that by the time of the 13th Tournament, I am _certain_ that the Neo-Chinese government will become disillusioned with us and remove us, by force if necessary," the elder Sai explained, his tone a bit graver than usual.

It finally dawned upon Saichi, for the first time but definately not the last, that he would be carrying the weight of a nation's fading pride and his own heritage's survival. Also for the first time, and _definately_ not the last, he brushed this fact off in a matter of seconds, the situation at hand proving vastly more important than the big picture as a whole.

"How will I feign defection then, Master?"

* * *

A typical marketplace on the Neo-Chinese space colony. While it was true that there was a fairly rich upper class in Chinese society - there had been one since the end of the fourth World War - which preferred to shop at more secluded, moneyed places, most people tended to shop from simple, enclosed marketplaces like this one, which closely resembled a Western shopping mall, only without any centralized ownership. All of the shops varied as well, ranging from fruit stands to clothing shops, and at several corners, Chicoline recruiters could be seen, working their wits and mouths - not to mention the arms that they used to carry entree papers for the Temple - to draw in potential students. 

In fact, marketplaces like this one were the primary recruiting grounds for the Chicoline Temple. Unlike the current Shaolin, they didn't wait for people to come to them, they got out and spread the word themselves.

This was increasingly obvious to Sai Saichi as he and Keiun began their trek through the front doors and down the corridors, running into a few of the would-be recruiters in the process. Everytime, one would look at Saichi with an appearance of perplexed disbelief - a _child_ in the Shaolin Temple? It didn't make _any_ sense, especially not with the fact that the Shaolin hadn't been able to draw in anyone under the age of thirty since the great defection.

Until, finally, the two of them arrived at their intended destination. A book shop. Despite being well into his late fifties, and despite the _obvious_ matter of his life as a Shaolin monk, Keiun had always had two things about him that made him different from the stereotype of the Temple's membership - for one, he had a sweet tooth the size of Rhode Island, for another, he was an ardent reader of conventional and martial arts-based fantasy and science fiction.

He had _sixteen _copies of the Lord of the Rings series, including the Hobbit and the Silmarillion, though he hadn't finished any of them since he preferred to skim through chapters with different languages for each one. He often used the excuse of 'honing his skills' as a Temple translator. Originally, he had hoped that the Temple would achieve such a revival that people would come from other nations, such as Neo-England, Neo-America, Neo-Russia, or even Neo-Arabia.

That said, it was a bit too convenient that the book store he had chosen - one of five or six, each of which had been markedly closer to the entrance than this one - happened to have a Chicoline recruiter standing outside.

"Stay here while I go inside," the old monk ordered as if speaking to his own grandson. Saichi merely gave a nod and posted himself by the door, standing as still as a statue in the process. Normally, he followed orders to the letter unless something was purely questionable about them, but this time was an exception to that rule. A part of his growing sense of dignity and honesty felt hurt and betrayed by the orders that had been given to him, but the rest of him knew what he was doing simply _had_ to be done, regardless of how many of his own morals he trampled in the process.

"Hello there."

Finally, he turned from staring at the doorway to the bookstore and turned, ever so slowly, to look up into the gentle, persuasive face of the recruiter who had been standing near the entrance. His face, which Saichi figured was normally _very_ jovial and pleasant, seemed overcome with shadows that weren't there, making him look as imposing and difficult as the task that the boy had been presented with in the first place...

* * *

Falsely defect and infiltrate the Chicoline Temple for three years, then re-defect back to the Shaolin Temple just before the qualifying tournament to select Neo-China's Gundam Fighter. 

It sounded hideously complex and hideously simple at the same time, but the truth was that it bordered some forsaken midground between the two. In order to blend in, one had to make friends, but how could one make friends if they didn't want to have to betray them in a few short years?

It was a vexing question that rode on the mind of Saichi as he looked himself in a mirror for the first time in weeks. It had been roughly twelve months now, twelve months since he had made his seeming defection and twelve months since he had begun to grow into things.

Truth be told, Saichi actually liked it _better_ with the Chicoline. The rules were relaxed in comparison to the rigorous routines of the Shaolin - he could sleep a little later than dawn, he could eat as much as he could cram down his gullet before meal time was over and he was free to bathe twice daily if he wanted.

Among other things, he was also allowed to slack off and be a kid from time to time, more so than the rare game of soccer back at the old Temple. He had been able to make a few friends on the outside, he even had a bedroom that was _his_, not because he was the only child in the entire school - here, he _wasn't_ - but because he was actually _cared for_ as more than just a wishful thought of the future. Back at the Shaolin Temple, they had treated him more as a servant than a true member, a shadow of his father and a shadow's shadow of his grandfather, but here?

Here, he was Sai Saichi. He wasn't Feilong's grandson, he wasn't Lonbai's only child, he was just another student. He was accepted, not _because_ of his heritage, though that certainly played a bit of a role in it in some ways, but because he was thought of as one of them.

He even had friends _in_ the temple. Boys his own age, a girl or two - women weren't banned from the Chicoline school like they were with Shaolin, which was _still_ struggling to accept them even after over four hundred years of effort in doing so - even a few teenagers he could look up to as if they were his own brothers.

His appearance had changed, he noted, with a sense of thoughtful awareness that didn't really apply to most children his age. He was a bit taller and his eyes had lost the seeming weight they once carried, they looked a bit brighter. He had aged a bit, and yet he looked younger and livelier now than he ever had before. Muscle was starting to become a little more apparent on his arms and chest, and his clothing had changed too, going from the blue training douji he had once worn almost day in and day out to a pair of tan pajama pants that were a size too wide in the legs, held in place by the same type of strings. He also wore a somewhat tight, white tank top that seemed to fit him far better than the half shirts favored by the Shaolin.

Black slippers and white socks. No wrist bands, and his hair...

His hair was starting to grow. At first, it had been like peach fuzz, but then it had begun to get some length to it, and now it was something of an untangled, inch long mess on his head, complete with side burns. Every strand was fine and straight, not a single curl. And then there was his skin...

His skin had begun to darken a bit. Maybe it was the constant hours that he opted to spend his time learning the arts of combat in the sun, rather than in a shaded training area or an enclosure with only a panoramic view of the outside world, but he had begun to gain a tan. In an eerie thought for a kid his age, Saichi felt that it was somewhat symbolic of his own lost dignity.

But then again, he wasn't terribly focused on his dignity anymore. Honesty was becoming subjective as well, but only to an extent.

"Yo! Sai!" Called a voice, rousing him out of his self-reverie and forcing his attention away from the mirror that hung in the bathroom connected his bedroom to three others

Stifling the urge to feel guilty, the cocked his head back to an impossible degree, turned to look at his visitor and quickly fell into the role he had been growing into more and more every day: The role of the fool. The joker. The slightly lecherous little punk. He found it _far_ easier to do, and far more comfortable, than being serious all of the time.

The catch to this was that it got him more friends than he wanted. More people he would have to betray at some point.

Among those people were the seventeen year old foriegner standing in the doorway with a lopsided frown that would one day give way to an immensely mellow, laid back attitude, dressed in almost the same outfit as Saichi himself, bar that his tanktop was a dark blue and fit more loosely. His name was Hans, quite possibly the most serious student of the Chicoline Temple since its creation. He was from Neo-Denmark, the only non-Chinese at the Temple, and it seemed almost as if _everything_ around him seemed to boil down to a challenge.

And everytime he got a challenge, he came back even stronger and more determined. He was probably the second or third most advanced student in the entire Temple, after Saichi, one or two others and the teachers themselves.

"Time to start already?" Sai asked a bit apprehensively, still wiping the sleep out of one eye. It hadn't been there a few seconds ago, but it was now.

"No, but I need a warm-up partner and you're the only one other than the teachers who's up for a spar, and the only one who's willing to take me on without being ordered to," Hans said with his slightly odd accent - odd to Saichi, at least - as if there weren't any room for arguement.

"Fighting on an empty stomach? Come on, bro, you _know_ I only get one chance at breakfast..."

"Not my fault you can't keep a steady schedule," Hans shot back, completely unphased. Arguing with the guy was like trying to win a war of words with a brick wall, it was utterly pointless.

"Can I at least get a donut or something?" Saichi whined, obviously not too high on health foods since he had been introduced to the vastly more varied menu of the Chicoline diet. Another thing, too, he _never_ used to whine. _Ever._

"No."

Pause. The boy let out a sigh, popping his knuckles and turning around completely before starting to walk after his intense colleague with the same stride of a death row inmate.

It would be another fifteen minutes before the two had finished their supposedly brief 'warm-up.' When it was over, each bore a few bruises on their forearms and legs, though they stood out a bit more on Hans since he was significantly paler, but neither was hurt. They were used to dealing with each other's fighting styles, advantages and disadvantages now, it was almost like watching a dance with the way that they moved. Sometimes Hans would take advantage with his size, power and stamina, sometimes Saichi would take the lead with his speed, agility and adaptiveness, but usually they would end in an absolute deadlock.

This was no different.

By the time it was all over, the two were sitting across from each other, legs crossed beneath themselves, heavy for breath, but not out of steam. Compared to some of their more notorious days, this had been a lighter bout between them.

"Thanks for costing me breakfast," Sai muttered half-heartedly, propping his head up in one hand and sighing as the typical instructor walked into sight, going through his usual before-class routine of a morning walk after a light breakfast and a bit of meditation. Hans didn't even bother responding, he was somewhat zoned out instead.

"Bro?"

"Hm?" The older of the two asked his younger friend, looking up from a picture he had suddenly been holding out of nowhere.

"Must've had it in his shirt," Saichi thought before motioning to the picture with a nod. Hans shrugged before speaking up in response.

"A shot of my sister's birthday. I couldn't attend since I'm out here and all," he said a bit whistfully, lifting the image up and turning it around so that Sai could see.

The people within were a slightly ragged looking older woman, a couple in their mid-thirties and a little girl standing between them, she didn't look older than seven or eight, with the same kind of hair that Hans probably would've had if he didn't keep it buzzed down, though it was kept in a long, thick ponytail that was draped over one shoulder.

"Cute," Sai said with a shrug, not bothering to ask the girl's name. He and Hans only knew scant details of each other, neither was exactly curious about the other's past. Hans was too focused on his studies to care about Saichi's history, and Saichi didn't want to know for fear that it might make his eventual re-defection even _more_ difficult than it already would be.

"Funny you'd say that," Hans commented, giving a rare break from his usual dedication and showing a sign of what he was _really_ like, a small glimpse of the laid back, cheerful young man who sat beneath the surface almost all of the time. He smiled, continuing. "You're... Nine now, right?" He asked, head tilted to the side. Sai gave a mute nod, already not liking where the conversation was going.

"She's only a half a year younger than you then, I think."

"... Um... Cool?" The Chinese boy shrugged out.

Hans blinked a bit. "I haven't seen her in two years. I wonder what she's like now?"

"What was she like the last time you saw her?" Sai asked curiously, though he almost instantly regretted showing even the slightest sign of interest. Having the urge to peek in on the girl's showers was one thing, even reading a naked magazine, it was all just decreasingly innocent curiosity at this point, but girls _his age_? Come on, they had to have some sort of disease or something!

"Kindhearted, generous... _Very_ mature," Hans listed off, only to quiet himself down at the blank look on Saichi's face. "Not interested, huh?" He asked knowingly, looking more than a _bit_ sardonic.

"... Nothin' personal bro, but..."

"Yeah, I know. Give it a few years, kid," Hans said mockingly, though the two were cut off before Saichi could try and shoot back a retort, already blushing near to the roots of his hair for a reason he didn't even know.

The striking of the gong in the courtyard meant that the first class of the day was about to begin. As one, the two sprang back up, the photo of Hans' family vanishing back into some hidden place inside of shirt as the other students started filing in.

* * *

A year went by, and things changed. 

He was ten years old now, physically developed into almost the exact physique he would have when he finally entered into the Gundam Fight, though his hair was a bit short and allowed to flow freely, and he still lacked the first dot upon his forehead. His clothing had grown to suit him, taking on tanned, pajama-like pants now, along with slippers and a dark green tanktop, though he now also wore a sash as a belt, tied around his waist with the knot and two loose ends hanging to his left side.

The place was the same as it had been on all of the days that he and Hans had sparred with each other and with their fellow students, the same as it had been during every day he spent practicing and honing himself at his own pace. His attitude had become a bit more slacked than when he was nine, his skin had darkened a bit more and his eyes were a little more defined. He had become a bit more mature, but a bit more childish at the same time.

The place was the same. _He_ was the same.

But it had also changed, and so had he.

Hans was gone, he had been recalled home for some reason or other, leaving in the middle of the night without so much as a good-bye. It hadn't hurt Saichi, he was secretly _glad_ that his part-time rival, part-time surrogate older brother had left, that meant one less person he might have to personally fess up to after the Gundam Fight.

Unfortunately, it meant he had also lost just about the only person who could keep up with him. He moved too quickly for even the trainers to effectively handle anymore, his stamina had improved to the degree that he could take a full level blow from the Chicoline master - right in the _face_ - and come close to shrugging it off without so much as even passing dizziness. In every way, Sai Saichi had moved ahead of the game, he was just a few steps shy of being in a completel league of his own.

And that was why they had selected him to take part in a coming in-temple tournament to decide who would serve as the Chicoline representative in the tournament to pick Neo-China's next Gundam Fighter.

That tournament was slated to start later today.

A bit too idly for his own good, the boy cracked his knuckles, then stretched his legs. It wasn't even morning yet, the sun hadn't risen on a new day in the Neo-Chinese space colony and only a few others were even awake right now, he had free reign over the courtyard, but what to do with it?

Lazily, he sat down, rather than start any early-morning warm-ups. It was all but a given that it wouldn't have done him much good anyway, Sai found that training alone tended to bore the freaking snot out of him, and without Hans around to try and keep pace with him, it was really the only thing he could do every morning. None of the other students were really up to par.

"May as well watch the sunrise," he muttered out to himself, holding his cheeks in hand and propping his elbows onto his knees, his legs folded under him as he slumped forward, facing the direction of the soon-to-be rising sun. He could make out the distant glimmer Neo-Japan and, beyond that, Neo-America. At night time, they and Neo-Russia were visible like nearby stars, unable to see with any detail using the naked eye, but still beautiful to look at nonetheless.

Neo-America.

Sai had a dream of going there someday, he had heard good things about it. Kids were free of responsibilities that were lumped on them in Neo-China, the atmosphere was relaxed, there was no single dominant nationality and everyone was different. It was a place where you were free to be yourself, a place, Sai felt, that he could be free to be _himself_, rather than what he was now.

A place where he could be a little lecherous, joker dirt bag without having it feel like an empty shell he put on to hide his true self. A place where he could make friends without knowing he would have to face up to them for ultimately selling them out, and a place where he wouldn't have some sort of set, pre-ordained destiny to follow in his forefathers' footsteps.

"I wanna go there," he mumbled out to himself, still watching the fading stars before sighing aloud and standing up. He didn't really feel like it, but he was going to have to warm himself up, maybe even tire himself out. If he was too exhausted to fight, that meant he might be able to believably fake a loss and diminish the damage he _knew_ he would end up causing someday, but there was the nagging feeling that the day in question would never arrive.

It was as distant to him as Neo-America. Never arriving, but always a constant sight on the horizon.

Slowly at first, but quickly gaining speed, he ran through movements that had been drilled into his head through countless hours of practice. Routines, self-invented combinations, tactics and strategies against self-imagined foes who could only be seen at the edge of the mind's eyes.

Sixteen punches in a blur that looked like four or five, a jump backwards and a straight kick at such an angle that it looked like it should have broken his hip and toes upon landing, a jump straight up that lead to a half-dozen mid-air roundhouse kicks, each whistling through the air like the dry tune of an old flute. The landing went in tune, on one hand and foot in a crouch, the other leg touching to the ground afterward before he straightened up and went to repeat it, this time walking forward with every punch.

With any luck, he really _would_ exhaust himself. With any luck, he _wouldn't _win the sub-qualifiers. With any luck, the day he dreaded would never arrive.

* * *

He won the tournament with little trouble. None of the other combatants could even last more than a minute and a half with him, but that had been a year ago. 

In the foriegn calendar that had replaced the original Chinese one, it was December 1st, FC 59. The national tournament would be starting within one week. He already had a Gundam of his own, the Solar Gundam, but that didn't matter.

It was midnight, the air was crisp enough that it almost hurt him to breathe it. The Chicoline Temple stood in the background, imposing but friendly. It had an air of family to it that the Shaolin had never possessed, an air that made his assigned task even more difficult than it already was. No one else was awake at this hour but the few dedicated monks who had made it a habit of praying once every six hours, even if it meant waking up in the middle of the night to do it.

They were in the shrine though, which itself was positioned behind the larger, castle-like Temple. It was an enormous structure, stretching for almost half a mile straight up, numerous courtyards at every single level, statues and monuments uncounted lining the wide staircase that lead down the artificial mountain it had been built into. The shrine was behind that Temple, but the gate wasn't.

The gate was right in front of him. The doors were wide open, like they always were, and the evening sky was light up brightly. Neo-Japan and Neo-America were as visible as they had ever been, shimmering just as brightly as they always did, every single night. For whatever ironic purpose, the two colonies, in particular, Neo-America, were settled directly in front of the gate.

A step forward was all it would take for that seeming inevitability to become a reality. One step and it would be over.

The lie he had been living since he was eight would be resolved, his true loyalties would be revealed and those who he had thought of as his closest friends would forsake and despise him. He would truly fullfill the destiny of a puppet with a pre-ordained, imperfectly scripted fate, set down by the grandfather he now felt he had never truly known.

Had he ever even known any of them? Were his family's supposed dream of reviving a martial arts school that now seemed so archaic that it probably _deserved_ to collapse and die of old age so important that it was worth giving up his own happiness to achieve?

Doubt struck into what had once been iron resolve.

He had changed again. He was eleven now, a bit taller, and he had grown a bit more into his own body, it seemed. His hair was now kept in a long, tight ponytail, with sideburns that had grown long enough to touch his cheeks. His clothes had changed as well, though the outfit he wore had been made by his own hands. A dark tan pair of pants, black slippers and black wristbands, red armbands and a thick, sleeveless white vest-shirt with a tail that ran down to just above the back of each knee, along with a green sash belt like his old one.

It was basically the same outfit and style he would have as a Gundam Fighter. He just lacked the dot on his forehead and the carefree bounce in his step.

"... Is it really worth doing?" He asked himself._ "One more step and I'll be Shaolin once again, but..."_

Doubt lingered. What had the Shaolin monks ever done for him? What had his own _family_ ever done for him?

He didn't even know his mother's name, he had only sparse recollections of his father and his grandfather had never done more than take him out a few times for his birthdays - and that was _before_ he had enrolled in the Temple.

"Just one step..."

The Chicoline had taken him in. They hadn't cared of his heritage as Sai Feilong's grandson, they had responded with genuine _sympathy_ over the news of his father's death, they had adopted him like a family. A gigantic, extended family with more brothers, sisters, fathers and mothers than he could count. Were a bunch of detached, weepy old men worth leaving them for?

"... Just as soon as I belong," he began heavily, looking up and back to the Temple that had been his home for three years. He had left a parting note, he doubted they would read it with sympathy, but it had been one final gesture he tried to make anyway.

"It's... Time I disappear, I guess," he said to himself, turning back to the gate. In one second, it was all over.

He took the first step towards Neo-America, the first step beyond the gates and the first step to the inevitable. Why he took it, he didn't know, but after it, there was no going back.

His feet felt like lead weights, but he continued. Guilt-ridden, biting back more than a few tears, he kept walking, gaining speed as he left the only home that had ever truly been _his_, finally bursting into a streaking run down the long, winding dirt road that lead into the very city he had first been recruited in.

Hours later, an older monk by the name of Xuan Ze made his nightly rounds, peering into the rooms of each student with the care of a parent, only to find that one was missing, and the only thing in his place was a single, folded note, not even placed into an evelope. It sat simply upon the pillow of a neatly made bed, within a room that had been tediously cleaned to the extent that it almost sparkled.

And it read:

To whom it may concern,

I'm sorry. I can't really

think of anything else to

say other than that.

- Sai Saichi

End Prologue II

* * *

Author's Note: More minor edits. Joy!

Again, for the curious, this entire chapter was basically inspired by one line of dialogue near the start of the first episode with Sai in it, and I'm not sure if its said in the original or not, but in the dub, Sai(I think) mentions that he spent time at the Chicoline Temple. Therein lies the basis for this entire prologue :P  
  
Hans was at the Chicoline because I always figured he and Sai were just a** bit **too surprised at each other, not to mention that their fighting styles struck me as being relatively similar. Sai only saw an out-of-date image for Cecil, also, and he never bothered to learn Hans and Cecil's last name, so he didn't much recognize her when they first met. She didn't recognize him because, to me at least, she seems to be the type who'd prefer burying her face in books rather than watching the news, even when it comes to something as momentous as the Gundam Fight. Hans also didn't have any pictures of Sai to show her, so there ya go.  
  
And credit to SaiSaiciAngel for correcting me about Sa'is father's name.  
  
Sh33p out.


	3. Prologue: Past Dealings III

  
  
**Foreword:** Soundtrack below, you know the drill by now.  
  
Trigun - Scattered Rain  
Episode I - Duel of the Fates(4:09 Remix)  
G Gundam - Evolve  
Better Than Ezra - One More Murder  
Creed - Inside Us All(or something similar to it)  
  
And this is where some of the dates get switched around.

* * *

** Sidetracked**  
Prologue: Past Dealings III   
  


"We have unconfirmed reports that casualties are now reaching into the low hundreds, with hundreds of others _still_ missing... We also have news that Jean-Pierre Mirabeua _has_ managed to elu-" Off with it.   
  
The screen went blank, the room was briefly darkened before the lamp was flipped back on, a long, pained sigh emitting from the lone man within. At nineteen, he was a prodigy of every European sword style still in existence, he was a master of the Knightly martial arts and had lived by the Code of Chivalry - bar one or two special circumstances - ever since he had been old enough to read.   
  
With his orange hair, violet eyes and soft complexion, he had the face and smile that had won the hearts of countless members of his country, most of them understandably women, and with his skills and strength, he had fairly, valiantly and honorably won the tournament that would qualify him to become the first member of the Sand family to ever earn a place in the Gundam Fight.   
  
For all of the strength he took pride in, for all of the chivalric dignity that was his birthright, for all of his pop star looks, he still felt as if the world had just stripped him of his uniform and broken his sword in front of his own mother. Disgrace didnt even come _close_ to measuring his feelings.   
  
The room was lit only dimly, occupied by half-opened, mostly-read books and a television as wide as most peoples bedroom walls, probably twice as tall. There were three couches, a loveseat, several chairs and a railed ladder that ran along a library-sized series of shelves holding everything from books to compact discs, along with a gigantic desk sitting at the middle of it all. It had only one occupant though, and he was the one currently staring off into space, orange bangs hanging out sloppier than usual, several empty bottles on the desktop in front of him.   
  
George de Sand had every right in the universe to feel like a million bucks. He had become a national _icon_ during the tournament, and now?   
  
Now there were probably a thousand or more dead because he had taken a simple action to save Neo-Frances royal family. He hadnt even succeeded in _that_, either, since Queen Clairiese Louise had died in the process. The private stands she had been sitting in had been too close to the main explosions and the following collapse of thousands upon thousands of tons of debris was beyond even royaltys ability to survive.   
  
"Some Knight," he muttered at last, leaning back in the chair in what was probably the most uncharacteristic fashion ever for him. Even in private, he upheld the code. His outfit was stained with the stench of soot and smoke, his hair was still dirty and his boots were lying somewhere else in the room, though his feet were soon slapped across the top of the desk. An empty bottle clattered to the floor, he didnt notice.   
  
Instead, he tightened his grip on the half-full bottle that he had in hand and took a swig. It tasted about as bitter as reality.   
  
"I couldnt even stop him..."   
  
A morbidly amused chuckle.  
  
Another swig.  
  
Finally, he set the bottle down and pushed back from the desk, giving the chair a spin before looking down at his clothes. The uniform was stained with black spots from where he had dropped out of his Gundam and run into the flames to try and help the rescue efforts. George de Sand may have been horrified, but he hadnt been paralyzed. He still had bandages on his palms from where he had literally _ripped_ a several hundred pound, scorching hot piece of concrete out of the way to allow the people behind it to escape. His hair had been singed black at the tips.   
  
"Master George?" Asked an older voice from the doorway. Raymond Bishop was the only other person in the entire mansion right now. The rest of the Sand familys weekend homes caretakers had been given the night off. Along with the day after it. George didnt want to see any of them.   
  
Raymond was just too stubborn for his own good.   
  
"I thought I told you to go take the night off?" The de Sand heir asked with a slightly drunken smirk. Raymond was completely impassive.   
  
"You did, but your mother asked me to stay. As a family friend, rather than a servant," he answered, craftily dodging through Georges threatening tone as if the words had never even been spoken. "And, as a family friend, I _must_ say that this is _most _unbecoming of you," he added, taking several groomed steps beyond the doorway and continuing towards the desk. The chair whirled back around though, and the older gent was almost halted instantly.   
  
Having known George de Sand since he was in diapers, Raymond Bishop had seen the full range of the young mans emotions, both negative and positive. From crying when he had lost one too many fencing bouts as a child to grinning ear to ear upon receiving praise for his masterful handling of the Rose Gundam just before the tournament, but in all of those nineteen years, Raymond had _never_ seen the sour expression of defeat that George had on his face right now.   
  
"Perhaps... Its time for you to go to sleep?" He suggested hopefully, taken somewhat aback. George only chuckled dimly, and if it were at all possible, he probably wouldve sunken even further into the chair than he already was.   
  
"And do what, dear Raymond? Have nightmares about thousands of people _dying_ because of my patriotism? It isnt like I can _sleep_ anyway," he shot back at the older gentleman with all of the lackluster sophistication of a drunkard in a back alley.   
  
"... Master George," the older of the two sighed out a bit testily.   
  
"If I had wanted a lecture, Idve put in a call to Mother," the younger grit out, alchohol numbing his ability to rationalize.   
  
"I didnt come here to lecture you, dear sir. In hindsight, I did, but now... I have a bit of a suggestion."   
  
"And that would be?" He asked with less patience than he usually did.   
  
"Well... To be quite blunt," Raymond began before taking a deep breath and continuing. "Stop _moping around _like a _fool _and _do something _about it. Mirabeau is still at large after murdering hundreds. _You_ have as much, if not _more_ of a responsibility to get out there and _do something _about him," he said with a pause, only to continue before George could try and speak up. "In short: Get off your ass and stop pitying yourself."   
  
With that, the elder man gave a short bow, straightened up, turned around and rigidly walked out of the room without so much as a good-bye, leaving George de Sand to sit there and stare blankly after him. Raymond _never_ used foul language. The last time he had even used a curse had been when George was a toddler, and his words carried _weight_.   
  
"... Nnnmm..." He voiced out, unsteadily getting out of his chair with a dizzied wobble or two, only to steady himself up on the edge of the desk. The look of self-pity was gradually replaced, narrowed lips curling up at one side, glazed eyes opening wide for a moment before narrowing back down, attentive, if not hazed from alchohol.   
  
Slowly, with growing determination, he started staggering drunkenly towards the doorway, intent on getting to his bedroom and then going to sleep. Tomorrow would be a busy day, to say the least...

* * *

Being French meant several things to George de Sand. For starters, it meant having to pre-empt insults by making it perfectly clear that he bathed twice daily with soap that was more expensive than the average middle-class households food costs for a _year_. In addition, it meant having a certain sense of national pride. Sure, he had been called a cheese eating surrender monkey more times than he could count by everyone from foriegners vacationing on the Neo-France space colony to foriegn opponents in fencing tournaments, but heck...   
  
He still had his pride. That pride was amplified by the fact that he had the distinction of being the youngest Knight in Europe - Neo or otherwise. He was also among the best, in upholding the Code of Chivalry, swordsmanship, dagger fighting, fighting without a weapon, even when it came to his appearance.   
  
What he _didnt_ take pride in was the fact that he had _cut_ his long orange hair to the style of a lower class _peasant_. His lengthy bangs, sideburns, even the hair on the back of his _neck_. He had gone so far as to change his clothes as well, switching from the regal uniform of a French nobleman to the underclass wear of a commoner.   
  
A dark green jacket worn over a long sleeved red shirt and a pair of brown pants. His shoes were borrowed from Raymond for the proper look of wear and tear, and about the only familiar features that one could use to identify him as Neo-Frances next Gundam Fighter were his violet tinted eyes and the dagger sheathed beneath his jacket.   
  
Duelling with swords was out of style in both Neo and Earthly France, but that didnt mean knives and daggers werent trendy. Even George, with his stately manner, had to admit that a knife or dagger fight had a noticably grittier, _personal_ feel than the romanticized, stylized and refined arts of swordsmanship. It also had the advantage of not being anywhere near as glamorous as a sword fight, meaning that if someone drew a dagger or knife, they meant **_business_**.   
  
Another thing he had to admit was that, for a young man who had spent his life being pampered and looked after in the grips of nobility, with the slight changes he had made to his appearance, he blended in _far_ better than he would have thought.   
  
The added effect of a still-strong _hangover_ didnt exactly diminish that fact.   
  
_ "Thats the last time Im going to spend a night drinking **anything** but French wine,"_ he affirmed to himself for the umpteenth time of the morning, even through the dizzied pain that still pressed against his senses. French wine was one thing, but American moonshine? The kind that had been _outlawed_ in Neo-France, available to the Sand family as a matter of the Counts experimental tastes?   
  
No. That was the _last time_ that George was _ever_ going to intentionally get himself drunk on anything that wasnt French. Fatalities be damned, the _hangover alone_ made it _above and beyond_ the call of duty.   
  
_"This looks like as good a place as any," _he reasoned, coming to a stop and straightening himself up a bit tiredly in front of the place.   
  
All things considered, it was probably one of the seediest _dumps_ in the city of Paris, which was where both George had felt would be as good a starting place as any. Considering Mirabeaus downright _stupidly_ dramatic and attention grabbing style lent itself to hiding in plain sight, it was probably better than spending days or weeks working around the newly re-established Interpol and however many national policing agencies had taken up the chase, or trying to work through the entire countryside.   
  
One considerable edge was that Mirabeau didnt speak anything other than French. That limited his hiding places _considerably_, to the extent that he wouldve only been able to find a proper hiding place in France and its former colonies, most of which spoke variants of French that wouldve been exceedingly difficult for a near _thug_ like Jean-Pierre to adapt to.   
  
As such, it was only partially shocking when George forced the cranky old door open and found himself greeted by the sight of a single figure standing out amidst the crowds of derelicits that tended to infest the bar he had chosen to start with. Not to say he didnt have to clench his jaw and force his lips shut so tightly that he almost went fish-faced at the sight before him, but still.   
  
_ "Mirabeau,"_ he spat in his thoughts, forcing on a calmer face than before. It wasnt an easy task, but he managed.   
  
The disgraced Gundam Fighter, a former special forces soldier in the military, sat within a few paces, dressed shaggily in a long, brown trench coat and a matching hat. Considering how careful he was to avoid speaking, to look dirty and to make sure that the coat wasnt top of the line, Mirabeau had hidden himself reasonably well.   
  
But his hair stood out like a sore, bloody thumb. The idiot hadnt even gotten it cut.   
  
It was like _fate_ had intervened on Georges behalf, bringing him so close to his target that he could almost _smell_ Mirabeaus scent as if it were his own, without even forcing him to spend days or weeks on a drawn out search for the mass murderer. It was so convenient, how things had practically fallen into place on the first try. The urge to make it pay off as quickly as the chance had been given to him rose like bile in the back of his throat, coaxing him to make the strike _now_, while Jean-Pierres back was turned.   
  
_ "Wait for it..."_ He kept telling himself though, closing in almost rigidly for what promised to be the kill at a slow pace, in spite of his desire to end it _now_. At this point, George de Sand genuinely didnt care too much for bringing his target in alive either way, he was out to dispense _justice_. At knifes edge, if need-be.   
  
He had appointed himself Judge, Jury, Witness, Prosecution _and_ Executioner. Pierres trial had ended before hed ever even been arrested.   
  
And that was when the blue haired villain went and virtually threw a monkey wrench into all of Georges grand schemes of justice and revenge, if only because he slowly, somewhat drunkenly began to stand up and turn around.   
  
Even after changing his appearance as he did, George de Sand had come to the conclusion that when dealing with his prey in this particular hunt, it was really only good for fooling everyone _but_ Jean-Pierre. As such, he decided, for the sake of his own emotions, however twisted that they were at the moment, to drop his act and draw his dagger instead.   
  
"Hello, Jean-Pierre," he greeted with a razor calm, his slender yet strong fingers already clasping onto the grip of the weapon he had hidden away in his jacket, his entire hand having vanished from sight to make the grab.   
  
At the sound of his voice, the blue haired fugitive tensed up reflexively. George didnt have to see Pierres face to know that his expression was as mortified as his own had been when the missiles started flying into the stands.   
  
"Its nice to see you remember me. Tell me though," he began, feeling every single bit of activity in the bar grind to a painful halt, and then also feeling his own _smile_ at the psychological effect of hearing the click and slide of the daggers blade exiting the small scabbard it was kept in.   
  
"Do you remember how many missiles you fired into the stands? Do you remember hearing the screams of _countless_ people running for their lives?" He asked with an uncharacteristic _lack_ of regard for the rules of chivalry. Justice was one thing, but knowingly taking pleasure in the knowledge that he was about to murder someone in cold blood?   
  
The darkness that would one day come to haunt him was truly _born_ in the seconds that it took for him to slowly but lethally finish drawing his weapon, the finely polished metal shining a hellstruck reflection into Mirabeaus eyes as he turned around to face his would-be executioner with a look that could only be described in one word.   
  
_ Fear.   
  
_ "... You..."   
  
Absolute, undeniable, inescapable _fear_.  
  
The kind that terrorists of ages past had _killed themselves_ to try and inspire, the kind that countless totalitarian dictatorships had crushed their people to try and create, the kind that turned the most wanted man in Neo-France into little more than a cornered deer caught in the sights of a sniper rifle.   
  
"_Die_," George said with a maliciousness that wouldve sent his own _mother _running, whipping the dagger back and making ready for the killing blow.   
  
His intent was to ram the tip of the dagger right through the side of Mirabeaus neck, nearer the back. Sever the spinal cord, cut any veins in the process and then watch the other bleed to death in paralyzed helplessness.   
  
That was his intent, but the survival instincts of a fugitive far outweighed the killer instincts of the man hunting him.   
  
In a flash, the two had made their moves. George and Jean-Pierre _both_ acted like men possessed - one seeking to kill the other, and his prey knowingly allowing himself to be stabbed right through the palm to block it.   
  
Blood sprayed like a miniature fountain around the daggers blade as it pierced Pierres skin, slipping between bones and then tearing through everything in its path before erupting back out, sending a larger spurt right into one of Mirabeaus eyes. He winced and bit back a scream, but with the last impulses he could manage in his newly injured hand, his fingers coiled into a vice-like grip around the handguard of the weapon, while his numbing arm gave a hard yank away.   
  
George fought to maintain his balance, but soon ceded against the slightly larger, more muscular mans strength, going to one foot and then finding the butt of his own weapon slammed into the side of his head like a small sledge hammer.   
  
The blow left him dizzy, and it left Mirabeau in agony, though that pain didnt stop him from pulling the dagger back out and dropping it to the floor as he made a run for the door. By the time that Georges vision cleared, his query was gone, but the emotions that the encounter had stirred remained the same.   
  
With a dignity and pride that offset what he had just tried to do, he bent down and picked his dagger back up, violet eyes narrowing with a glance around the bar. Almost instantly, activity picked back up.   
  
Wiping the blade off with an already dirtied napkin from the counter, George re-sheathed the weapon in his jacket and then took off again, speed walking to the door and almost ripping it from the hinges as he made his way back into the street. A bit of blood trailed down from a major bruise on the side of his head, but he was as impervious to it as he was to the seeming betrayal he was making to the Code with every thought that passed through his orange haired head.   
  
_ "The hunt is on, Mirabeau,"_ he thought, disregarding almost everything that Raymond had ever taught him. If the old butler had known, he probably wouldve suffered a heart attack at the thought.   
  
_ "Im going to find you, and when I do..."   
  
_ Thoughts trailed to the view of the dagger slipping through Jean-Pierres flesh, the blood squirting out like a geyser from the sheer force of the attack.   
  
"The wound I gave to your hand will feel like a pleasant memory," he vowed beneath his breath, passing by the alleyway that his query had hidden himself in without ever even knowing it.

* * *

"I take it that your first hunt was... Unsuccessful?" Raymond asked with as soothing a tone as he could manage, setting down a tray with two cups of English tea on it. It had been a favorite drink of Georges ever since he had become a fan of Neo-Englands Gentle Chapman, he often had a habit of drinking it whenever he was stressed or thoughtful.   
  
Right now, he was both.   
  
"I gained a bruise and managed to stab him through the hand, but that was it," George replied glumly, holding a small ice pack to where the hilt of his own dagger had been used against him. "I could have ended it - I could have ended his _life_ without him ever even realizing my presence. Instead I chose to stop short and move in slowly, then when he tried to get up..."   
  
He paused, in the manner that Raymond could easily tell was to avoid slapping himself for feeling foolish. The elder of the two finally seated himself at the other side of the table, thoughtfully regarding his younger charge and then waiting for him to continue.   
  
"I gave away the element of surprise in favor of trying to strike fear into him. I dont know _why_, but I do know that... I _enjoyed_ it. I _enjoyed_ seeing the terror in his eyes. I _enjoyed_ seeing the hope _wash_ right out of him and I _enjoyed_ feeling the _dagger_ stabbing through his hand. Im not sure if its just the thrill of the hunt or something else, but it scares me," he admitted dimly, sighing right after and then taking a sip of his tea.   
  
Raymond was unenthused. His graying mustache twitched with the motions of his lips, but without even needing to think to find the words, he said them. He was like that when it came to giving George guidance, after all, he was probably closer to the de Sand family heir than his own father was.   
  
"A slip along the path youve chosen in life isnt going to be an easy thing to recover from, my boy. I fear that there may be something dark awakened within you by the recent events that weve seen, but I _am_ confident that you can find your way past it. Remember the Code that you follow," he began, knowing that it had taken those first words just to grab Georges attention.   
  
"Justice. Loyalty. Faith. Humility. Mercy. Nobility. Remember those, my boy, and youll come through this all the better. Otherwise, I fear that Ill have to _re_-school you in them..."   
  
A pause.   
  
"_Again_," Raymond said with a slight frown. It wasnt like George de Sand had learned the modern day ideals of chivalry overnight, after all.   
  
"Ill try," the younger of the two shrugged with a fading chuckle, taking another sip of his tea and then pausing for a moment.   
  
"Where do you think Jean-Pierre is heading next? He probably knows that hiding out in the seediest of places will only halt the authorities, not me..."   
  
"To be quite honest, George," Raymond began, finally grabbing his own cup from the tray on the table between them. "I believe that Jean-Pierre is going to Hell, next. It may take a little while, but Im quite sure of it," he finished, promptly taking a sip of his drink like a proper gentleman. George frowned dully.   
  
"I meant in _this_ lifetime," he clarified.   
  
"Whoever said that Hell could only exist in the afterlife most _certainly_ hadnt counted on the existence of the French prison system," Raymond replied with an honest, assertive tone to his voice, pausing again to try and think of a way to put it better.   
  
"I believe the phrase is something like... Dropping the soap in the prison showers?" He asked, glancing to George, who was just staring at him with one of the most vacant looks that the older gent had ever seen.   
  
"And I thought _I_ was vindictive..."

* * *

_ "Keep running,"_ he thought, his hand tucked limply into his jacket. The blood had caked the wound shut at some point, and combined with a makeshift bandage made out of a strip from the lining of his coat, Jean-Pierre had at least the vaguest of hopes that it would heal properly, though that was only a guess. He knew, at least, that he could still move all of his fingers to some degree or other, and that he could make a fist so long as he avoided the very center of his palm with it.   
  
It _would_ have to be his dominant hand to take the injury. In hindsight, he could think of at least six different ways to have parried or blocked the attack, but none of that mattered anymore. He _had_ to keep moving, because in addition to the authorities, he now had Neo-Frances next Gundam Fighter on his tail.   
  
George de Sand.   
  
He almost spat in contempt at the mere thought of the orange haired noblemans son who had unjustly defeated him and then cost him his rightful revenge.   
  
So what if he had situated himself in front of the stands? The government had been _stupid enough_ to put them there in the first place! An advantage was an advantage, hed just been the only one _smart enough _to use it.   
  
And it had gotten him disqualified by a pompous, fat _prick_ who hadnt even had the intelligence to see how clever Mirabeau had been in using the crowds to gain an advantage. Gundam fights were things that were done to gain control of the planet and its outlying colonies, trying to have them carried out with petty concepts like sportsmanship and fairness was like playing Russian roulette with a plasma cannon, in Jean-Pierres eyes, anyway.   
  
A crack of thunder issued overhead, instinctively he stopped running down the sidewalk and dove into another alleyway. He had been fortunate enough to make it into the single most unlawful part of the city right off the bat. It was an area of Paris that could be considered downright anarchistic. The police were practically _afraid_ to try coming in, the people kept to themselves and illegal activities were so common that they werent even noticed.   
  
Even _murder_ was so common that it could be done and gotten away with in the open, in broad _daylight_ no less. The only people who would care were the street rats who made a living off of picking dead bodies clean of any remaining valuables, or the organ and corpse thieves who made their living selling those same bodies for whatever cash they could get.   
  
As seedy and brutal as the area was, the Neo-French government wouldnt do anything about it. It was a lost cause, everytime they had tried, it had gotten numerous federal officials killed and only caused the area to grow - at best, it could only be contained. The local government, Pierre felt, probably figured that the entire local structuring would fully collapse someday, and then they could move in and clean things out with the military or something.   
  
Thankfully, that wouldnt be happening anytime soon. At least, he _hoped_ it wouldnt be happening anytime soon.   
  
Rain began to pour from above, Mirabeau growled to himself and looked around. There were only two or three others in the alley. He could see one of them crawling under a worn cardboard box, and another was sitting there with a bottle in a paper bag, completely oblivious to the storm overhead.   
  
Jean-Pierre grit his teeth and set his sights on an old dumpster. The sides were worn away with rust, the roof sported several holes, but it was empty and he was desperate.   
  
Wishing against all odds, the fugitive wondered how he wouldve been fairing if hed been able to keep his hold on the Mirage Gundam, but after a few seconds, that thought became little more than a faded, upsetting memory. He had positioned himself inside of the dumpster, on the side with the least holes, and then promptly slammed the lid shut.   
  
It never occurred to him that the people in the alleyway looked a bit too cleancut to be ordinary members of the anarchistic society he had sought to hide himself in, nor did it occur to him that the one with the bottle had been watching him with the eyes of a hawk.

* * *

Glass shattered in the early morning quiet of the de Sand familys weekend home.   
  
George stared at the television with a shellshocked expression. He was still dressed in the robe he had thrown over himself after climbing out of bed, his surprisingly unkempt hair sticking out in every way since it was now too short to weight down and cover half of his face like it usually did, and his eyes were still slightly encrusted from sleep. His mouth hung open, blood trickled slowly down his palm from where he had shattered the glass cup in his hand.   
  
The maid nearby paused in what she was doing, sparing a glance his way before her eyes instantly went down to his bleeding, clenched fist, which was also dripping with the orange juice he had been intent on drinking.   
  
"We repeat, for those just tuning in, Jean-Pierre Mirabeau _has_ been captured as of late last night by the Neo-French authorities..."   
  
For precious moments, the maid watched as her violet eyed employer stared blankly at the screen, slowly mouthing out words that didnt even exist. Raymond, who sat at the table behind her, wore a grim look upon his face, viewing the scene of his former protege through the corner of his eye and doing his absolute best to maintain as silently neutral as possible.   
  
"Were receiving word that he is being treated for a stabbing wound to his left hand, however, before hes to be brought to trial for the Tragedy at Versailles. More on this story, as it arrives."   
  
_ Tick._   
  
_"I hereby award victory of the Neo-France Gundam Tournament to George de Sand!"_****   
  
_ Twitch.   
  
__"Wait for it..."_****   
  
_ Inhale.   
  
__He had changed his entire appearance, lowered himself down to a mere commoner for the exclusive purpose of **hunting** down Jean-Pierre Mirabeau like an **animal**._****   
  
Wood splintered beneath the butt of an already bleeding, juice covered fist before George bluntly, _angrily_ stormed out of the kitchen, the door slamming shut behind him with enough force that the entire room seemed to darken a second or so later, even if it was only passing cloud cover.   
  
The maid stared on, mortified, but Raymond only shook his head with a deep breath before speaking up again.   
  
"Dont worry about the damage to the countertop," he ordered. "Just contact one of the handymen and have them fix it. Clean up the juice and the glass though," he added, receiving an eerily calm nod as he stood up. Considering that he had always been quite the early shiner to begin with, Raymond had already gotten dressed, wearing one of his usual business suits.   
  
Tiredly, he straightened up his tie and walked off to where he felt that George would go next.

* * *

Sidestep forward to the right, thrust forward to the left, recover. Six thrusts, hop back, slice down and to the right, follow through with a kick towards the inner thigh. Halt.   
  
"As predictable as you were when you were a sullen child after losing too many rounds."   
  
Twist, parry.   
  
They stood across from each other, Raymond Bishops own foil having been batted aside by the cross guard of the weapon that George held in his hand. The older gent had already finished recovering by the time that the younger fencer had recognized him.   
  
"As I recall though, the last time you did this, you were actually keen on having a sparring partner."   
  
"What do you _want_, Raymond?" George asked hotly, straightening up out of his fighting stance and lowering his sword. He was still dressed in his blue robe and white pajamas, right down to the fuzzy orange slippers on his feet.   
  
"For you to calm down," the older of the two replied about as bluntly as the business end of a baseball bat. "Mercy and loyalty before prowess and justice."   
  
"It was _your_ idea to hunt down Mirabeau, not mine," George growled.   
  
"Then it was _I_ who made the mistake," Raymond shrugged calmly. "Thus its not _your_ place to drive yourself to the breaking point over it," he concluded. The other regarded him with palpable annoyance.   
  
"Give me one excuse why I shouldnt _fire you_ then," he ordered. Raymond paused thoughtfully, knowing that he was about to gamble with what amounted to his entire _life_ in the process.   
  
"Because, I will resign first, and spare you the trouble," he said, quietly muttering a prayer in his thoughts as the words hit the air like ice water, pouring into Georges ears in a similar fashion. He even held an expression as if someone had just woken him up from a nap by dumping cold water on his face.   
  
"No," he grumbled, regaining a small inkling of his composure. "Ill calm down, but only on one condition," he began with a slowly forming smile.   
  
"And that would be?" Raymond asked, though he already knew what it was well enough that he tightened his grip on the fencing tool he held, lowered at his side.   
  
"Stop fighting so damned unfairly," George cracked with the same smile that had been twitching onto his face a few seconds earlier.   
  
"What do you mean?" The older of the two asked, raising his weapon in a classical stance that was almost mirrored by his former student and current superior.   
  
"When I fight," George began, pausing to make a half cut into a thrust, one which Raymond smoothly ducked under, sidestepping around his younger protege and straightening back up, his foil coming down with a whistle for the back of de Sands orange haired head.   
  
"I do so with only my hands, my sword and my pride," he continued, half-turning and bringing his sword back up. The foil stopped hard against its smoothed side, and almost instantly, George punched the lower side of the rapier and forced Raymond back, giving himself just enough time to recover and make another thrust. Thankfully, it was ceremonial and dulled on all edges, even if it had hit, it wouldntve done much more than to bruise the older man and maybe knock the wind out of him.   
  
"When you do it, you fight with your heart," George finished, drawing back as Raymond turned out of the way and masterfully held his balance, taking up another classical stance with a soft smile causing his mustache to tilt up at once side.   
  
"_How_ can a mere Knight hope to defeat _that_?" The younger competitor asked his old teacher. Raymonds reply was as honest as he almost always tried to be, finding itself spoken at the exact moment that he chose to make his attack.   
  
"Simply fight with your heart, George," he said, thrusting once and then swivelling his wrist, bringing the foil under Georges attempted parry and striking him with the balled tip, right into the stomach. The foil bent upward, Raymond advanced with a step and then yanked the foil back.   
  
The duel paused briefly, each of the participants waiting for a moment where they could both strike out.   
  
"Fight with your heart," Raymond repeated once more, just as the two began to make their attacks once again.   
  
It would only be a matter of months before the old butlers age would finally start catching up to him, but as the two carried out one of their last spars on even terms, neither really noticed the eyes of the eleven year old princess focusing in on them, settling closely upon the orange haired Gundam Fighter.   
  
She had come for a simple visit with her father, both had been accompanied by Count de Sand and his wife. It had been intended to give them the chance to get away from the media attention that had been hounding them both for two days now, a nice chance to gather their wits and grieve together in privacy.   
  
Her name was Princess Maria Louise. What she said to herself was a single word, spoken at a tone that was barely above a whisper.   
  
"George..."   
  
_

End Prologue III

_  
  


* * *

**Authors Note:** Yet **MORE!** minor edits!  
  
Kudos to SporkGoddess for giving me(what I hope) is the right age for Maria Louise. Since this takes place three or so years before the Gundam Fight, Marias only eleven when her crush on George kicks into high gear(you know, outright fangirl levels and such).  
  
That said, this is one of the parts where the dates have been switched around a bit. Originally it was just because I had forgotten when the Versailles Tragedy had taken place, now its just because Georges hair probably needed that long to grow back out.  
  
And before you complain about George going psycho - that 'darkness in his heart' had to have some initial trigger event after it the seeds for it were planted with Mirabeaus massacre, and I intend on getting **way** more mileage out of it than a one-episode 'Domon, be friends! ;.;!' type of thing.  
  
Also, any help on how many deaths there were at Versailles would be appreciated(I cant remember if it was 999 or 1500 or more... Bah).  
  
Sh33p out. Next update is when/if I ever get off my lazy ass and write the Chibodee prologue. 


	4. Prologue: Past Dealings IV

  
  
**Foreword:** Music selection is below. Do note that you don't _have_ to listen to the songs, but they're what I listened to as I was writing it.  
  
Before The Fight: Rurouni Kenshin - The Wars of the Last Wolves  
Overall: The Matrix - Battle Scene Music or Clubbed to Death  
Flashback 1/2: Trigun - Not An Angel  
Flashback 3/Afterward: Papa Roach - Take Me  
Towards the end: Rocky - Eye of the Tiger

* * *

**

Sidetracked

**  
Prologue: Past Dealings IV   
  
"Now arriving, our first competitor, the man with 49 first round knock-outs to his name, the man whose name singlehandedly _dominated_ the Eastern half of this tournament... He's a son of the South, raised up in New York, bred from the Heartland and _wilder_ than _anything_ out West..." _  
  
"Ya can say my name now..." _  
  
"**_CHIBODEE CROCKET!_**"   
  
The crowds roared on all sides, the robe came off and his shell went with it, just as _exactly_ half of the arena lit up. Ever the smooth entertainer with the heart of gold, the purple-and-pink haired boxer raised one gloved fist and gave a slick, almost flirty little smirk to the crowd, at least half of them being women, and the other half not caring either way. Janet, ever the one most obsessed with clothing, took the robe and hurried down off the apron, blowing a quick kiss to the audience as she did so.   
  
"And his opponent..."   
  
Slowly, with a charisma that could only be defined as sloppy and appealing all at once, Chibodee turned back around to face his still-shadowed opponent, idly chewing on one of the countless thinly grown reeds that were a part of his trademark.   
  
"Knock 'em dead, champ," Cath whispered into his ear as the crowds started to die down in anticipation, almost seeming to forget Chibodee as if he hadn't even entered the ring yet. With that, the Spanish woman turned to the crowd, sauntered off by a step or three and repeated the actions of Janet, blowing a kiss to everything in sight. With that, she simply jumped down to the floor, landing on high-heeled feet with a grace that would've made a professional dancer weep.   
  
"Another true symbol of the American dream - _reborn_ as it is now..."   
  
"Good luck out there," Bunny whispered into his other ear, then spun around with one hand clinging to the top rope for balance, then doing the same as Cath and Janet by blowing a kiss to the crowd before hopping down from the apron. She didn't have Cath's balance and grace, but she managed well enough.   
  
"Born and bred in Mexico, moved to the States at an early age, he started training as a martial artist and _never_ looked back. He's considered the fastest fighter of the tournament so far, and one of the toughest, with grappling techniques that no man ever managed to escape. _He is_ a _symbol_! Of our great nation's heritage, and came out of nowhere to be the favorite for this year's finals..."   
  
There were a few tense seconds as Shirley waltzed up behind him, standing next to the turnbuckle and placing both hands onto his shoulders. From there, she just squeezed.   
  
"Give it up, for Nicolas **HERNANDEZ!**"   
  
The arena went black for less than a second, and then the lights started patterning on and off in a line over the crowds, almost like a visual whirlwind, closing in rapidly until the lights over the remaining half of the ring came on. The man standing there held none of Chibodee's charisma and charm, but instead held the appearance of some kind of finely chiselled god. He was easily close to a head taller than Chibodee, putting him over the roof of 6'7" that almost all of his previous opponents had been, wearing the fist and ankle wraps of a kickboxer with a pair of black gi pants of a typical karate practitioner. His hair was short but messy, with a black shine to it that complimented the naturally dark tone of his skin, every muscle seeming to stand at full, taut attention.   
  
And then there were the eyes.   
  
Those dark brown eyes, narrowed with an air of menace that had probably done more damage to his previous opponents than his fists or feet combined. They were complimented by a face so perfect that it almost made Chibodee's own support crew swoon, every single line and angle perfectly defined by the one after it.   
  
_ "This ain't gonna be a cakewalk,"_ he thought to himself, putting on the air of nonchalance that had saved him at _least_ once through this tournament.   
  
"Just remember that any giant can be chopped down," Shirley commented, then stepped down from the apron without the showgirl attitude of the other members of Chibodee's crew. Her words hadn't even fully registered in his ears by the time the announcer finished his spiel about how the only rules were to stop when the other guy went down for the count and to avoid taking things outside, along with the use of 'foriegn objects,' like knives, guns, sledge hammers...   
  
Everything else was pretty much up in the air. This tournament _wasn't_ for amateurs.   
  
"Ready..." The announcer waited to continue, making it a point to get the _hell_ out of the ring as the referee climbed in. Almost at the same time, Chibodee and Nicolas left their respective corners, meeting halfway at the center of the ring for a time honored tradition that had played itself out all over the world and in every colony before any professional bout - trash talk.   
  
"I'm going to break you, redneck," Nicolas stated about as bluntly as a baseball bat, with a look to match. He ignored how Chibodee was already starting to bounce up and down in the traditional boxer's strut.   
  
"Can't break the dream, greasebag," Crocket shot back with a smirk.   
  
Hernandez slid back one step and arched down into a conventional kickboxing stance, middle of the road and utterly unreadable. Chibodee replied in kind, seeming to hover back by a single step and then coming to an absolute _stop_, his gloved hands coming up defensively and the reed between his lips dropping down to the floor. The crowds went silent, the announcer waited, and _kept_ waiting until the moment was just right, and their anxiety for the start had hit its peak.   
  
"**_FIGHT!!!_**"   
  
The bell rang and the lights over the crowd and around the ring went completely dim. The eyes of both a nation and the colony that ruled it were watching as the fight began.   
  
"Here we _go_!" Chibodee shouted, but Nicolas was all business.   
  
Cold sweat blew into the air as the kickboxer threw the first blow of the match, Chibodee sidestepped on a fluke and used one arm to keep the punch at bay and stop it short of turning into a hook. His other fist went into an opening round cross. Nicolas took the blow in kind, but only barely. Like a dancer, he twisted out of the way on impact, the skin of his cheek threatening to go numb from the near-miss as he pulled a complete 360, his closest foot slinging up towards Chibodee's head.   
  
The world _rattled_ in slow motion, the purple headed boxer's teeth felt loosened from the blow and his feet lost their place in a stumble. Nicolas slipped back into an upright stance like water, promptly lunging forward again with a loud yell, one fist drawn back...   
  
_"You look so handsome!" She stated with all the enthusiasm of a young single mother, a smile as big and bright as the sun flashing across her face as she fixed the collar of his suit.   
  
"I think I look dumb," her son, a boy around the age of five or six, with dark blue hair and big green eyes replied. Considering that he was wearing loafers, shin-high socks, green shorts and a matching jacket with a red bow tie at his throat, one could easily see why he thought as much.   
  
"Oh, you do not," she countered. A few more seconds went by as she smoothed out his hair, though a few errant locks still curved upward despite her best effort. "I'll bet money that all the little girls there will just be **fawning** over you."   
  
"**Mommy!**"   
  
"What?"   
  
"You **know** that's embarrassing to me..."   
  
"Alright, alright," she soothed, standing up straight at the door.   
  
"I still don't get why you made dress up like this," he complained, reaching out to take his mother's hand as she opened the door.   
  
"You'll see, now come on or we might be late!"   
  
"Late for what?" Chibodee sputtered as the two of them began to half walk, half jog their way down to the barely functioning elevator of the worn down apartment building they called home.   
  
"It's a surprise," she answered with a smile as they came to a stop inside. The button for the bottom floor was pressed, and the old steel doors began to slide shut._****   
  
A punch whistled through the air and hit nothing, the sweat literally flying off of Hernandez' fist as Chibodee's instincts kicked in. Without even seeing the attack coming, he ducked under it, stepped back and to the side and straightened up. Nicolas recovered again without even seeming to miss a beat, planting one foot onto the mat and slinging the other in a roundhouse kick, the momentum from his punch only adding to his speed and balance.   
  
An ankle crashed into a gloved backhand and Nicolas stumbled forward, catching himself on the ropes and straightening up while Chibodee lowered his hands to his sides and began to regain his rhythm.   
  
"I _definately_ underestimated you," the boxer commented mockingly, using his steady floating motions to get some distance between himself and Hernandez. "I _won't_ make that mistake again," he pointed out, slinging his fists up and gritting his teeth. Nicolas simply sneered and backed away along the ropes, both men starting to circle each other in a bid to gain some sort of upper hand.   
  
Lights flashed all around them, the announcers glorified their first clash and the crowds cheered, yet even under the watchful eyes of an entire nation and the colony that ruled it, neither man paid anything else the slightest bit of attention.   
  
_"We're here," she announced with no small amount of pride as she finally loosened her grip on his hand. It was a sunny day out, brighter than it had been in months, and hot too, with only an occasional breeze to lessen it all...   
  
But the moment he realized what she had meant, young Chibodee Crocket's eyes widened to the size of silver dollars. All of the sudden, it really didn't matter if it was hot, nor did it matter that they had walked for almost a half an hour to get here either. As if in slow motion, his mother could see his lips widening and opening into a curled smile that threatened to breach the sides of his face and poke right into his ears.   
  
It was probably the happiest she had ever seen him, since his father had left.   
  
"The circus! This is the surprise?!" He shouted out in awe, all but bouncing as his grip on her hand tightened to the brink of bruising her.   
  
"Yes, it is. We're gonna buy all-day passes, get some hot dogs and icecream-"   
  
"I wanna see the elephants!" Chibodee blurted out. "And the clowns and the acrobats and the magicians and the lions and the tigers and the Farris Wheel and-and-and-and-" The boy stumbled and trailed off as he set his eyes onto a balloon stand. Fidgeting briefly, he glanced up to his mother and waited, chewing on his bottom lip in the meantime.   
  
"And get balloons," she finished with another radiant smile.   
  
With that, Chibodee finally let go, running off towards the stand with his mother in tow..._****   
  
There was a blur of movement, twice at once, and Hernandez stumbled back in shock with a fresh bruise across his right cheek while Chibodee juked over to the right. It had been a classic feint - left jab, right hook - done at speeds that would make an ordinary boxer's head spin, but it had only been the start.   
  
Without even waiting for Nicolas to recover or mount a counter-attack, even as cameras across the arena belatedly flickered in an all too late bid to catch what had just happened, Chibodee went back on the attack. Floating in like one of the professionals of old, he ducked down and narrowly ended up avoiding a spinning elbow-into-a-backhand combination, only to lash out in kind and score a solid uppercut into Nicolas' chin.   
  
The Mexican-American man stumbled back again, bleeding from the mouth before hitting his back into the ropes. Chibodee again closed and-   
  
"**_HA!_**"   
  
Promptly got a facefull of both feet when Nicolas wrapped his arms in the ropes and jumped back, using them for leverage into a standing dropkick. In an instant, momentum shifted and it was Chibodee's turn to stumble back and away, but by the time he finished recovering, Hernandez had done the same. Both men didn't even bother giving each other the once over or setting up any kind of defense as they charged in - Chibodee still all but floating and Hernandez doing what looked like a cross between dancing and speed walking.   
  
Another clash followed. Chibodee threw the first punches once again, but Nicolas countered, swatting most of them aside with such speed that it left Crocket's hands sore even through his gloves, while Hernandez' arms started turning a rather sickly shade of purple about half-way. Finally though, Nicolas slipped in a fast-one, dropping down beneath one of Chibodee's punches and using a sidekick to sweep out the shorter man's legs near the knee. Chibodee didn't even have time to blink before he was flat on his back, but with the skills of a boxer and a wrestler at once, he was already starting to roll away-   
  
But Hernandez _still_ caught him.   
  
All but diving onto Chibodee's upper body as the man was rolling onto his side to try and spring back up, Nicolas quickly managed to grapple the shorter man's left arm before twisting it around behind his back. Chibodee let out a grunt and went to try and free himself, but before he could finish slinging out an elbow into the nearest part of Nicolas' body, Hernandez had caught it and put it in the same position as his left.   
  
_ "Crap,"_ Chibodee managed to think while both of his arms were being wrenched this way and that. He might have known a bit of wrestling, but this level of grappling was completely beyond him and-   
  
And Nicolas was standing up, his arms almost positioned so that his hands were clutching Chibodee's wrists, but leveraged against his shoulder blades from beneath either of Crocket's arms. It was a confusing hold, and one that became infinitely more painful in the seconds that it took for Nicolas to literally fling Chibodee up into the air, holding him in place so that he was not only upside down, but promptly left to drop back down on Hernandez' shoulder.   
  
Five rows back, they could still hear Chibodee's spine cracking.   
  
"_Give up_!" Nicolas ordered, lifting Chibodee's upper body a bit. "Give up now, or I'll break your neck!"   
  
His legs were starting to go numb. It was a triumph that he wasn't screaming his lungs out, as opposed to the way he was grinding his teeth and biting back teeths from what felt like a career ending injury waiting to happen.   
  
"_Give up, Crocket_!"   
  
_Two balloons later, the boy was all but running frantically for the three ringed circus tent, cackling jubilantly with his mother in tow. He had lost his own balloon by now, children have a tendency to have slippery fingers at times, but his mother's had been an adequate replacement... Barring the fact that it was pink, of course.   
  
Soon enough though, Chibodee and his mother had made it into the tent and claimed some of the very best seats inside, literally racing another family to it in the process. With balloon in hand, he had watched the clown car - the start of the performance - pull up near. One by one, the performers filed out into view, literally popping out of windows, from the roof, even the hood and trunk, and with each one, Chibodee was left laughing his head off without ever noticing the seemingly fake machine guns that each clown had in hand.   
  
It was going to be a show he would never forget..._****   
  
And the crowd and announcer were audible. His had focus shattered in the instant it took for him to actually register them again.   
  
"... Looks like Crocket is on the receiving end of what Nicolas calls the Butterfly Breaker! The same move he used to end the careers-"   
  
_ "Shut 'em out,"_ he ordered himself, trying to literally pull himself free as his legs started kicking again.   
  
"... To do... _Can he escape it_?!" The announcer asked, while half the crowd started booing and the other started cheering themselves into a frenzy.   
  
"_Have it your way_," Hernandez whispered while Chibodee tried to blindly kick him or hook his feet into something.   
  
_The balloon popped._****   
  
With that, Nicolas took a few steps forward, heading for the center of the ring in spite of the flailing, kicking mass on his shoulder. Even so, he was lifting Chibodee a bit higher, putting ever more stress on the boxer's shoulders and arms, not to mention giving him a better chance of delivering that one kick to the spine that he _knew_ would make Hernandez drop him...   
  
After all, nothing was inescapable.   
  
_Chaos followed. Somewhere along the way, someone had shoved him and Chibodee went flying over the edge of the stands. For a good ten feet, he tumbled and finally crashed, luckily avoiding a broken neck by the merit of flipping onto his backsomewhere along the way. Without even opening his eyes, the boy had hurled himself up to his feet, almost unphased by the fall and the push before it...   
  
Something whistled overhead, he heard his mother screaming and felt something warm splatter into his hair from behind and-   
  
And something thumped into the dirt just a few feet away.   
  
Without even looking to see what had just happened, Chibodee broke into a blind run - **away** from the stands, and away from the chaos they were consumed by as bullets continued whistling overhead._****   
  
Unfortunately...   
  
_An arm came flying out of nowhere, and Chibodee was blindly swept up from the ground before being brought to someone's chest. Flailing, kicking and screaming, he refused to open his eyes, even as the deafening roar of gunfire continued blaring through his ears._****   
  
Nicolas' Breaker was close enough.   
  
_"**MOMMY! MOMMY, HELP!**" Chibodee screamed out, worming one arm free and reaching out for... Something.   
  
The only response he got when he opened his eyes was the point blank view of a cackling clown's malignant face, followed with an even louder scream than the gunfire.   
  
"**MOMMY'S DEAD!**"_****   
  
Chibodee's view of the world shifted so rapidly that it all became nothing but a lightning quick blur of color and an inaudible drum of sound. Nicolas had yanked him down from his shoulder so swiftly that he didn't even have the chance to steel himself for what he knew was coming, and then-   
  
_"**MOMMY!**"_****   
  
**_ CRACK!   
  
_ **_"**MOMMY'S DEAD!!!**"_****   
  
Chibodee came to a bone shattering halt as Nicolas dropped into a kneel and pulled him straight down to the point that the taller man's knee slammed into Crocket's spine like a solid steel hammer. As the world went into slow motion, Chibodee felt the way his shoulderblades and spine all bent for several hundredths of a second around Hernandez' knee. It was all so violent that the announcer instantly ran out of words and several people in the crowd fainted, while the sound of the blow all but rang out through the air as if it were the bell being rung.   
  
The last thing he saw as Nicolas let his arms go was the view of the girls.   
  
_Gunfire and laughter continued, and in the middle of it all, a puny little boy with dark blue hair was left to do nothing more than burst into tears as all Hell broke loose._****   
  
Cath and Janet were crying hysterically, Bunny had fainted and Shirley looked on the verge of throwing up.   
  
After that, the world might as well have gone pitch black as Chibodee Crocket was dropped down, first onto his head, then onto his stomach. A second later, his legs finally hit the floor, and all he could see was the mat beneath him.   
  
Nicolas, on the other hand, guiltlessly stood up and walked back to his corner to await the ten count.   
  
"... Is..."   
  
_Some time later, maybe a few days or a few weeks, he had been sitting in a waiting room while his new foster parent signed a set of documents to verify things. A normal child would've undoubtedly been thrilled at the prospect of a new home, but Chibodee Crocket, the boy who'd lived through a massacre where even his hostage takers had been shot to death by a police SWAT team, wasn't thrilled at all. A psychologist had diagnosed him as having some sort of post traumatic stress syndrome, triggered almost instantly to varying degrees by contact with clowns, and it was probably going to stay with him for the rest of his life...   
  
And that was one of the lesser traumas he'd gone through.   
  
His mother was dead, his father had never shown himself to claim custody, he had no grandparents, aunts or uncles and no godparents that he actually knew of. No-one to take him in but the faceless state and the sickeningly sweet foster parent who'd offered him a new home. One that promised to be so sterile that he'd likely be better off in a mental institute.   
  
Staring at the floor in a pair of jeans and an old t-shirt that had been uncovered in his mother's belongings, Chibodee knew that he had been deprived of a better life. His mother, according to what he'd heard slip from the news, had managed to buy tickets to the Colony, even a small apartment waiting for them to move into. He would have finally been able to live in a better off neighborhood, with nice people for a change...   
  
People who weren't urban terrorists waiting to happen.   
  
The men in clown suits had stolen it all from him, and now his new foster parent was going to do even worse by keeping him here...   
  
"I'd... I'd rather live in the streets," he muttered out, only to have a realization dawn upon him as he did so...****_   
  
"... Is he... Is he dead?"   
  
_He knew that he would have to run away, if he ever wanted to be free of the memories of what had happened. It wasn't a realization out of maturity or immaturity either, merely a base instinct manifesting itself as the simplest choice he would ever make._****   
  
"... God, is he _dead_?"   
  
_Without a word, without a second thought or even the slightest of doubts that he would succeed, Chibodee flung himself down from the hard plastic chair and walked over to the door. No-one was there to stop him as he reached up to the knob on tip-toes and gave it a turn before making his way out into the hallway.   
  
From there, he turned to the nearest door marked exit, started running and never looked back._****   
  
Movement.   
  
Every jaw in the entire arena may as well have dropped down and shattered on the floor at the very instant that he began to twitch and spasm his way into rolling over, breathing so hard that his lungs felt as though they were on fire. His eyes opened to a blurred view of the ceiling before he managed to shift his gaze over to where he _knew_ Hernandez was standing. The taller man was leaned back against the turnbuckles, arms hanging limply across the ropes, jaw sagging open and face screwed into a look that closely resembled a deer caught in the headlights of a speeding truck.   
  
After a few seconds though, he spoke, and for the first time, Chibodee realized something.   
  
Nicolas Hernandez was utterly terrified of him.   
  
"I broke you..."   
  
That realization alone made him laugh, even though it hurt just to breathe anymore. Almost as bitterly as a pair of age old rivals, the two locked eyes, and that was when Chibodee spoke right back to him.   
  
"Can't break the dream, pal," he rasped out with a smile before bringing his hands up to either side of his head.   
  
The pain simply ceased to matter anymore from there, as his entire body curled inward towards his chest. Knees threatened to hit his shoulders, and in all of a split second, Chibodee Crocket sprang back up from the mat so quickly that one could almost hear a whistle in the air. When it was all over, his boots smacked down onto the floor so forcefully that the entire arena might as well have shaken, and bit by bit, he could _feel_ the momentum shifting.   
  
Even if he couldn't feel his legs in the process.   
  
_"This one's for you, ma," an older Chibodee, around thirteen or fourteen, muttered to himself as he dipped a bit of pink hair dye into his bangs before his first professional fight._****   
  
His feet knew what to do, even if he didn't know whether or not he could tell them to do it. With a numb sting through his bones, he registered himself starting to jive up and down, the rhythm all but flooding back into his body in the process.   
  
"... _HE ACTUALLY GOT UP! HE'S ON HIS FEET!_" The announcer belatedly shrieked out, causing virtually every single person in the crowd, regardless of who they had initially supported, to burst into a cheer that borderlined fanaticism.   
  
"Wanna try that again?" Chibodee asked, drawing his arms up as Nicolas stared at him.   
  
For several seconds, bar Chibodee's juking and jiving, neither man moved even an inch from where they stood.   
  
"... You're a madman," Nicolas sputtered out before finally drawing himself out of his corner and approaching - more hesitantly this time than ever before.   
  
Fifteen seconds later, there was a crack like a baseball bat scoring the winning home run. A gust of wind shot through the arena and it was all over. It had started when Hernandez threw a single punch. Chibodee had sidestepped so quickly that he had almost blurred out of sight all together, and then, he'd delivered a haymaker so fierce that his glove had actually exploded on contact with Nicolas' already bruised right cheek. The blow had sent the latino man flying back several inches off the ground, crashing back-first into the same corner he'd just been standing in so forcefully that it bent outwairds and finally leaving him to slump down onto his knees against the ropes before falling over, completely unconscious and bleeding severely all over the right side of his face.   
  
The ensuing roar of the crowd was more deafening than any gunshot he had ever heard, and as his rhythm slowly died away, his legs began to feel more and more like jelly because of it.   
  
"I... I think it's safe... To say that this one's over with..." The announcer sputtered out as the girls flooded into the ring and all but propped Chibodee up a split second before his legs gave out completely. Half of them looked ready to kill him where he was hanging, the other half looked ready to have his children on the spot, but none of them said anything. Even Shirley was smiling from ear to ear with a grin that could've blinded a man in broad daylight.   
  
"The _winner_ of the Thirteenth Gundam Qualification Tournament, as a result of one of the single most dramatic comebacks I think we'll _ever_ see..."   
  
_ "This one's for you, ma..."   
  
_ "**_CHIBODEE CROCKET!!!_**"   
  


_ End Prologue_

* * *

**Author's Note:** Sweet Baby Jesus did this one ever take me a long-ass time to pound out o.O;;; A few days over a **YEAR**... That's the single longest it's ever taken me to update anything. Ever x.x;  
  
That said, a few things. First off, I know Chibodee apparently had the pink in his hair long before he turned thirteen, but to me, it seemed more probable for him to dye it the way he did. Secondly, sorry if anything seemed rushed at all(even if it took a year to write all of this -.-; ). This chapter alone went through two-dozen rewrites, half as many deletes and probably even more minor edits before Nicolas finally showed up and beat me into finding a proper way to write it...  
  
And speaking of Nicolas: He's a one-shot character, unfortunately. The sad part is that I enjoyed writing him pretty well, especially since it was nice to really present a straight-up, no-holds-barred _CHALLENGE_ to one of these guys... One that didn't exist in a 55 foot tall war machine.  
  
That all out the way, assuming anyone is even paying attention still, I'll try to be quicker about the updates from now on, but no promises.  
  
Sh33p out, folks. 


End file.
